The Congressional Globe

27TH CONG....3D SESS.

which, if lawfully performed in open warfare upon armed enemies, instead of being piratically perpetrated in profound peace upon sleeping victims; an action which, as a military exploit, would have disgraced the military history of the sovereign Abbess of Quedlinburg, (whose contingent to the armies of the German empire was one dragoon and three foot soldiers;) this action is made the theme of every praise, and the subject of every honor. And why? For the sake of the action itself? No. The British are not so poor in military exploits as to seek renown in such a cowardly piece of assassination! Why, then, do they honor, reward, and celebrate it? Because it was a lesson to the people and to the Government of the United States! Because it was a declaration to this Republican Government, that if it was either not able or not willing to restrain its own citizens from going into Canada, the Canadians would restrain them! that they would cross the line and chastise them! and if the United States said a word to the Canadians, Great Britain wou'd chastise the United States! This is the reason. It is because McNab and his crew, in attacking the Caroline, attacked the United States--smote its flag-struck its Government--struck the whole Union-and emphatically said to us, they would chastise our citizens for

threw the unfortunate outbreak which took place in Canada. [Cheers. He called it outbreak, because he thought they would agree with him, that, in meeting upon such an occasion as the present, to do honor to Sir All McNab, they ought not to say anything in that rooin, which could arouse any feeling of hos tility on the part of any individual. [Cheers.] Having for the last three days been engaged in attending and speaking at very large meetings, he really felt himself little competent satisfactorily to discharge the duties of the office he had undertaken; but he felt the utmost satisfaction in proposing the health of their distinguished guest, and he hoped, when he returned to Canada, he would assure the loyal inhabitants there that Englishmen looked upon them as fellow-subjects, fellow countrymen, and brothers, whose paramount duty it was to cultivate warm feeling of good will towards each other, [cheers;] that Englishmen felt they were one and all in the same boat; and, whatever enemy might arise to threaten or to assail them, Englishmen would maintain their cause, Englishmen would protect and defend them, Englishmen would compliment and reward those who did their Canadian brethren service; for in so doing, they supported the flag of Eng. land, under which Nelson triumphed, and Wellington conquer. ed. [Loud cheers.]

The toast was drunk with three times three, and one cheer

more.

Sir A. McNab, in rising to respond to the toast, was received with loud and reiterated cheering. The gallant officer spoke as follows: My Lord Duke and gentlemen, the flattering manner in which you have proposed iny health, and the enthusiasm with which it has been received by so distinguished a company as the present, demand my warmest gratitude. I hope, however, no man will believe that I am vain enough to suppose that any services which I may have rendered either to the colo ny from which I came, or the empire of which it forms a part, could possibly entitle me to this highly flattering mark of your regard. I therefore merely consider myself on the present occasion, as the fortunate individual in whose person a well-merited compliment is intended to be paid to the loyalty and devo. tion of the people of Canada. [Cheers.]

I have now the gratification of publicly declaring in England, that no service could have been more dif. ficult, more dangerous, or more gallantly performed, than the destruction of a vessel employed to succor and sustain those who were in arms against her Majesty; and I well know that I express the sentiments of the people of Canada, when I state that they look forward with intense anxiety to see the loyalty and gallantry of Captain Drew generously rewarded. [Loud cheers.] They feel that he, in an bour of grave emergency, rendered them a great and important service, which, as loyal and honest men, they never can forget, or too highly appreciate. [Cheers.]

I beg again to thank you most sincerely for the honor you have done ine, and beg to drink all your good healths. [Loud cheers.] Sir D. McDougall proposed "the health of the militia and Joyal volunteers of Canada," avowing it as his opinion, that the militia of Nova Scotia and the North American provinces would, under a proper organization, be fully sufficient to defend themselves against any enemies that might threaten them. In support of this opinion, he triumphantly appealed to the ex ploits performed with his volunteers, by their distinguished guest, Sir Allen McNab.

The toast was drunk with great cordiality.

Mr. Urquhart then proposed "the health of Captain Drew, who signalized himself so much in the affair of the Caroline. " The Duke of Richmond, before the toast was drunk, also took the opportunity of pronouncing a high eulogium on the gallantry and prowess of that distinguished officer.

Captain Drew, who was most enthusiastically cheered, in brief and extremely modest terms, acknowledged the compli

ment.

He expressed his great obligations for the kind and partial manner in which Sir A. McNab had spoken of him; and, although the speech of his distinguished friend might lead them to suppose that, as yet, he had received no reward for his services, he begged to assure them that he had conferred upon him a very great reward, in the approbation of so distinguished a company as the present-as high a compliment as he could be paid for all he was enabled to perform. [Cheers.] But, if that was not enough, he might say his services had also been appreciated and acknowledged by his most gracious sovereign. He could not conceive a higher compliment. This gratified his ambition, and left him nothing to complain of. [Cheers] If on any future occasion his services should be required, the approbation of such a company as the present would greatly stimulate him to still greater exertions in defence of her Majesty and her dominions. [Loud cheers.]

The British Treaty-Mr Benton.

us, and Great Britain would back them in doing it! It is for this lesson, read in blood and flames to our Government and people, that the assailants of the Caroline are honored. And blind is the American, and dead to his country's honor, who does not see this outrage in this atrocious light.

The fact of this supposed apology being disposed of, I turn to the doctrines which accompanied it, and which I find most abundantly strange. The Secretary adduces, and the President adopts it, as a further reason for dropping the affair of the Caroline, that the outrage was not recent-that it occurred four or five years ago. This seems to be a new application of the principle of statutes of limitation, with short time for it to take effect. Tempus non currit has heretofore been the maxim among nations; and, in the case of the frigate Chesapeake, was rigorously enforced against Great Britain. The attack on that vessel was made on the 22d day of June, 1806: the apology for it was made on the 1st day of November, 1811. Nearly five years and a half had elapsed; but tempus currit, in the case of national outrages, was not then the maxim of our Government. Five years and a half was no bar at that time. Only three years and a half have elapsed in the case of the Caroline; and the outrage is barred by time!

Again: the Secretary adduces, and the President repeats it, as a further reason for dropping the complaint, that the aggression happened in the time of his predecessor. This is true: but is it a reason for not redressing the wrong? In the code of legitimacy in Europe, no notice is taken by the true King, when restored to the throne, of the aggressions upon the nation while the usurpers reigned-such as Napoleon in France, Murat in Naples, Joseph Bonaparte in Spain, and Louis in Holland. Does modern Federalism apply the same principle in the United States? It would see n so, from this adduction as a reason for giving up the complaint-that the outrage happened in the time of Mr. Van Buren! It did so: but by what fatality mention Mr. Van Buren's administration in connexion with this affair, at the risk of reviving the recollection of Mr. Forsyth's noble letter to Mr. Fox, in December, 1840, and contrasting it with the craven epistle of his successor to the same minister in March, 1841 Certainly, this is the first time in the history of our country that a change of administration was supposed to make a change in the rights of the country and the duties of the Government. It was not so formerly, when the apology for the outrage committed on the Chesapeake in Mr. Jefferson's time was redressed in Mr. Madison's. But, change! change! change! was the signal-cry at the election; and, God knows, we have got it-change enough-change in everything, even in the code of public honor, and in the catalogue of national duties.

The jus belli doctrine is another, and the fundamental error of our Secretary and the President. War has its laws and its rights; but they belong to a state of war, and cannot be invoked in time of peace. When Admiral Cockburn, during the late war, sailed up and down the Chesapeake, burning cabins and pillaging hen-roosts,-these acts, though very unbecoming civilized warfare, were still acts done jure belli; that is to say, in right of war. They were shielded by the laws of war; and the Virginia and Maryland courts could not have punished the marauders as offenders against their laws, without contravening the law of nations, and subjecting us to reprisals. But let a British admiral try this conduct in time of peace, and he will soon see that the sovereign's assumption of his offence, and the invocation of the jus belli, would be in vain pleaded when the courts got hold of him. So of this attack on the Caroline: if war had existed between the United States and Great Britain, the laws of war would have shielded it: there being no war, the jus belli is in vain appealed to. The assump

tion of the act by the Sovereign, has no other effect than to add another to the list of offenders; leaving the offended party to pursue either, or both, as it pleases. The nation is very silly that, having an ordinary culprit in its hands, which it can punish

However, as it is impossible for the best regulated State, or for the most vigilant and absolute Sovereign, to model at his pleasure all the actions of his subjects, and to confine them on every occasion to the most exact obedience, it would be unjust to impute to the nation or the Sovereign every fault committed by the citizens. We ought not, then, to say, in general, that we have received an injury from a nation, because we have received it from one of its members.

"But if a nation or its chief approves and ratifies the act of the individual, it then becomes a public concern, and the injured party is then to consider the nation as the real author of

Senate.

by due course of law, turns him loose, for the pur-
pose of laying hold of his Sovereign. This might
do very well with the warlike Romans, who wanted
pretexts for seizing dominions; but it will not do for
us, an agricultural and commercial people, who want
peace and trade.
To admit it, would be to give
immunity to all foreigners violating the laws of the
States, whom their Sovereigns should choose to
shield. The admission of the present Administra
tion, that the attack on the Caroline could be justi
fied under the laws of war, was just as false in
point of law, as was a state of war false in point of
fact, between the United States and Great Britain
at the time. And the pretext of giving up McLeod,
for the sake of getting at his Sovereign, was, as
everybody knew at the time, a pusillanimous in
vention to get rid of the whole affair.
And here,
let it never be forgotten, that, for the purpose of en-
abling Great Britain to shelter herself under the
laws of war, our Secretary makes two admissions,
neither of which has the least foundation in point
of fact. First, he assumes that there was a state of
war existing between the United States and Great
Britain; which was not the fact. Next, he as-
sumes that McLeod was in the military service of
Great Britain, subject to military orders; and, hav-
ing received orders to go upon this expedition, he
was bound to go, or be shot for mutiny. Now, all
this is sheer invention. McLeod was not in the
military service, subject to orders; he was in civil
life. He was not ordered to go upon this expedi
tion; he volunteered. He was not obeying, but an-
ticipating his Government; and that, without its
knowledge. The Schlosser outrage was not known
in England until after it was perpetrated; nor Mc-
Leod's offence assumed, until after he was caught;
and then merely as a means of extricating him
from danger. Thus our Secretary perverts the

facts, in order to adapt them to his misquoted law.
To make a false admission of the law of nations
-to accept apologies where none were offered-
to pervert the facts of the case-to send the Attor
ney General, and a major general of the army, to
protect and defend McLeod-and to give a receipt
in full for the outrage on the Caroline, without
receiving a particle of atonement for it;-to do all
this, would seem to have been enough. But it
appears that our Secretary negotiator did not think
so; and that he could not permit Lord Ashburton
to return to London, without carrying home with
him further propitiation in a renewed apology for
the delay in getting McLeod released, and in an
act of Congress to prevent such delays in future.
This renewed apology, and this act, were to be the
last and highest evidences of his Lordship's com-
plete success in humbling the United States at the
footstool of the British Queen; and, that nothing
should be wanting to our degradation, and to his
Lordship's triumph on his return, the Secretary
hastened to deliver him the one, and to procure him
the other. In the concluding paragraph, in his
same note of the 6th of August, he volunteers re-
newed assurances upon these two points:

"It was a subject of regret that the release of McLeod was so Jong delayed. A State court-and that not of the highest jurisdiction-decided that, on summary application, embarrassed, as it would appear, by technical difficulties, he could not be released by that court. His discharge, shortly afterward, by a jury, to whom he preferred to submit his case, rendered une cessary the further prosecution of the legal question. It is for the Congress of the United States, whose attention has been called to the subject, to say what further provision ought to be made, to expedite proceedings in such cases."

McLeod has been released for a year past. His arrest continued but for a few months, with little personal inconvenience to himself; with no danger to his life, if innocent; and with the gratification of a notoriety flattering to his pride, and beneficial to his interest. He is probably highly delighted with the honors of the occurrence, and no way injured by his brief and comfortable imprisonment. Yet the sorrow of our Secretary continues to flow. At the end of a year, he is still in mourning, and renews the expression of his regret for the poor man's detention, and gives assurances against such delays in future;-this in the same letter in which he closes the door upon the fate of his own countrymen burnt and murdered in the Caroline, and promises never to disturb the British Government about them again. McLeod and all Canadians

the injury, of which the citizen was, perhaps, only the instru

27TH CONG.... 3D SESS.

are encouraged to repeat their most serious facts upon us, by the perfect immunity which both themselves and their Government have experienced. And to expedite their release, if hereafter arrested for such facts, they are informed that Congress had been "called" upon to pass the appropriate lawand passed it was! The habeas corpus act against the States, which had slept for many months in the Senate, and seemed to have sunk under the public execration, this bill was called" up, and passed cotemporaneously with the date of this letter. And thus the special minister was enabled to carry home with him an act of Congress to lay at the footstool of his Queen, and to show that the measure of atonement to McLeod was complete: that the executive, the military, the legislative, and the judicial departments had all been put in requisition, and faithfully exerted themselves to protect her Majesty's subject, from being harmed for a past invasion, conflagration, and murder; and to secure them from being called to account by the State courts for such trifles in future.

Their

And so ends the case of the Caroline and McLeod. The humiliation of this conclusion, and the contempt and future danger which it brings upon the country, demand a pause, and a moment's reflection upon the catastrophe of this episode in the negotiation. The whole negotiation has been one of shame and injury; but this catastrophe of the McLeod and Caroline affair puts the finishing hand to our disgrace. I do not speak of the individuals who have done this work, but of the national honor which has been tarnished in their hands. Up to the end of Mr. Van Buren's administration, all was safe for the honor of the country. Redress for the outrage at Schlosser had been demanded; interference to release McLeod had been refused; the false application of the laws of war to a state of peace had been scouted. On the 4th day of March, 1841, the national honor was safe; but on that day its degradation commenced. Timing their movements with a calculated precision, the British Government transmitted their assumption of the Schlosser outrage, their formal demand for the release of McLeod, and their threat in the event of refusal, so as to arrive here on the evening of the day on which the new administration received the reins of Government. assumption, demand, and threat, arrived in Washington on the evening of the 4th day of March, a few hours after the mauguration of the new powers was over. It seemed as if the British had said to themselves: This is the time-our friends are in power-we helped to elect them-now is the time to begin. And begin they did. On the 8th day of March, Mr. Fox delivered to Mr. Webster the formal notification of the assumption, made the demand, and delivered the threat. Then the disgraceful scene began. They reverse the decision of Mr. Van Buren's administration, and determine to interfere in behalf of McLeod, and to extricate him by all means from the New York courts. mask the ignominy of this interference, they pretend it is to get at a nobler antagonist; and that they are going to act the Romans, in sparing the humble and subduing the proud. It is with Queen Victoria with whom they will deal! McLeod is too humble game for them. McLeod released, the next thing is to get out of the scrape with the Queen; and for that purpose they invent a false reading of the law of nations, and apply the laws of war to a state of peace. The jus belli, and not the jus gentium, then becomes their re

sort.

Το

And here ends their grand imitation of the Roman character. To assume the laws of war in time of peace, in order to cover a craven retreat, is the nearest approach which they make to war. Then the special minister comes. They accept from him private and verbal explanations, in full satisfaction to themselves of all the outrage at Schlosser: but beg the minister to write them a little apology, which they can show to the people. The minister refuses; and thereupon they assume that they have received it, and proclaim the apology to the world. To finnish this scene, to complete the propitiation of the Queen, and to send her minister home with legal and parchment evidence in his hand of our humiliation, the expression of regret for the arrest and detention of McLeod is officiously and gratuitously renewed; the prospect of a like detention of any of her Majesty's subjects in future is pathetically deplored; and, to expedite their delivery from State Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.-Mr. Rives's speech.

The British Treaty Mr. Woodbury.

courts when they again invade our soil, murder our citizens, and burn our vessels, the minister is informed that Congress has been "called" upon to pass a law to protect them from these courts. And here "a most serious fact" presents itself. Congress has actually obeyed the "call"-passed the actsecured her Majesty's subjects in future-and given the legal parchment evidence of his success to her minister before he departs for his home. The infamous act-the habeas corpus against the States -squeamishly called the "remedial justice act"--is now on the statute-book; the original polluting our code of law, the copy lying at the footstool of the British Queen. And this is the point we have reached. In the short space of a year and a half, the national character has been run down, from the pinnacle of honor to the abyss of disgrace. I limit myself now to the affair of McLeod and the Caroline alone; and say that, in this business, exclusive of other disgraces, the national character has been brought to the lowest point of contempt. It required the Walpole administration five-and-twenty long years of cowardly submission to France and Spain to complete the degradation of Great Britain: our present rulers have completed the same work for their own country in the short space of eighteen months. And this is the state of our America! that America which Jackson and Van Buren left so proud! that America which, with three millions of people, fought and worsted the British empirewith seven millions fought it, and worsted it again -and now, with eighteen millions, truckles to the British Queen, and invents all sorts of propitiatory apologies for her, when the most ample atonement is due to itself. Are we the people of the Revolution?-of the war of 1812?-of the year 1834? when Jackson electrified Europe by threatening the King of France with reprisals!

McLeod is given up, because he is too weak; the Queen is excused, because she is too strong; propitiation is lavished where atonement is due; an apology accepted where none was offered; the statute of limitations pleaded against an insult, by the party which received it! And the miserable performers in all this drama of national degradation expect to be applauded for magnanimity, when the laws of honor and the code of nations stamp their conduct with the brand of cowardice.*

It is a noble maxim of the English law, that every Englishman's house is his castle-inaccessible to every intruder but the law! "Not that it was surrounded with walls and battlements; it might be a straw-built shed. The winds of heaven might whistle through it; all the elements of heaven might enter it; but the King could not-the King dare not-enter it." So said the great Lord Chatham of the Englishman and his house. Not so with us, in this fallen state of our country. We have no king here, it is true, to break into our houses; but we have a Queen of England to send her Canadian subjects here to do it--to send them here to attack, kill, burn, and capture! and then to return to their royal mistress, to receive the rewards which are due to the chastisers of her Majesty's bad neighbors.

I have now finished what I had to say against the ratification of this treaty; and, in coming to the conclusion of so grave a subject, and one to which I have made so much opposition, I deem it due to the occasion to declare my future course in relation to it. I take it for certain that the treaty will be ratified-reluctantly and unwillingly ratified. In that event, I shall abide by it in all its provisions which come within the pale of the treaty making power-oppose it in all that lies beyond that pale. The national boundaries come within the pale; and they must remain as they are established, bad as they are. The money payments to Maine and

*Every individual is permitted to recede from his rights, to abandon a just subject of complaint, or to torget an injury. But the conductor of a nation is not as free, in this respect, as a private person. The latter may hear only the voice of generos ity, and, in an affair which interests none but himself alone, deliver himself up to the pleasure he finds in doing good, to his love of peace and tranquility. The representative of a nation -a sovereign-cannot consult himself; cannot abandon himself to his own inclination. The rights of the nation are benefits of the nation are benefits of which the sovereign is only administrator, and he ought to dispose of them no further than as he has reason to believe the nation itself would dispose of them.

Seldom is it safe for a nation to dissemble or pardon an injury, unless it he manifestly in a situation to crush those who are so rash as to dare to offend it. It is then plorious to pardon those who acknowledge their faults. Parcere subjectis et debellare superbos: and it may do this with safety. But, between two powers that are nearly equal, suffering an injury, without requiring complete satisfaction, is almost al ways imputed to WEAKNESS or COWARDICE: it is the means of soon receiving from them those that are most ATROCIOUS. [Vattel's Law of Nations.

Senate.

Massachusetts are domestic and legislative ques tions; and, as claims addressed to Congress, I shall consider them, and do what I believe to be right. As treaty stipulations, I shall resist these payments; for I cannot admit the policy or the right of Great Britain to interfere between the Union and its members, and to acquire the character of mediator, protector, guarantee or remonstrant between them. The fugitive offenders article I consider inoperative without the aid of an act of Congress; and that aid I shall be unwilling to give, because I consider the stipulations of the article as dangerous to foreigners who may come to our country, and useless to us, in the two eminent cases in which the surrender of fugitive criminals would be most wanting the cases of slaves and counterfeiters. The alliance articles, both naval and diplomatic, I hold to be beyond the pale both of the treaty, making and legislative power, and eminently dangerous and unwise; and shall oppose them in all the forms in which the question of their execution shall come before me. I shall defeat the appropriations for this African squadron, and for the pay and outfit of these remonstrating ambassadors, if I can; and if Great Britain complains, and demands the execution of the treaty in these particulars, I shall consider it a demand for the tributethe tribute in men, money and ships-which we are to pay her for five years' exemption from British search, and for so many years' reprieve from intended subjugation to the quintuple alli

ance.

BRITISH TREATY. [SECRET SESSION.]

SPEECH OF MR. WOODBURY,

OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.

In Senate, August, 1842-On several points arising in the discussion of the treaty with England. After Mr. RIVES had closed his opening speechMr. WOODBURY said that he did not propose now, if at all, to enter into an examination of the whole of the various topics which had been alluded to. Many of them-such as the case of the Caroline and the Creole, the right of search, and the question of impressment-were matters not even named in the treaty, and, of course, seemed irrelevant now. But the great question of the Northeastern boundary was the essential part of the instrument; and as an attempt appeared to have been made, through the chairman, to cast a doubt over our former claims on that frontier, in consequence of the discovery of some new maps, Mr. W. felt bound at once to repel it. Whether he should vote to ratify this part of the treaty, or not-according as full consideration might in the end seem to require--this much is certain: that he never should approve it on the ground that our title to the whole of the disputed territory was in the smallest degree shaken by anything which had yet appeared. Other high and momentous motives, connected with peace and war, as well as with the conduct of future negotiations or hostilities by a party so doubtful as to trustworthiness, and so embarrassed as that now in power; others connected with the recent assent of Maine and Massachusetts-the States alone directly interested-to the particular boundary adopted in the treaty; and others looking to the diminished importance, yearly, of all questions of boundary between us and neighboring powers on this continent, where we grow so much faster than they, and are destined ere long to be suprememight justify a ratification of the present stipulations. We shall see in a few days.

But, to seek an apology for doing it, in arguments against our undoubted rights, derived from loose conjectures of itinerant Americans in Europe, or from suggestions calculated to belittle the claim, and injure the reputation of one of the able negotiators of the treaty of 1783, did not seem to Mr. W. very patriotic, or at all warranted by any of the facts in the case.

The French map of 1745, which, with its red lines, running west from the St. Croix, had been made to occupy so prominent a position in this debate, was doubtless one illustrating the boundaries between the French and British colonies in America, before the conquest of Canada by England, and its cession in 1763.

There is a similar map in the French atlas, on the table of the Secretary, which I procured from the State Department. The publications of that day

27TH CONG....3D SESS.

are full of corresponding descriptions, as well as maps, on the part of France. But, at the same time, Great Britain, with whom we are now treating, and whose claims then are ours now, always resisted the pretensions of France to crowd the southern Jimits of Canada so far south, and the western limits of Nova Scotia so far west.

Instead of permitting Nova Scotia, or Acadia, to come to the Kennebec, or even to the Penobscot, she herself originally granted it to come only to the St. Croix; and made and described its western line as one running north from the source of that river till it reached some stream connected with the navigable waters of the St. Lawrence. Here is her Latin charter of that province, and an English iranslation, giving this, in substance; and it was this boundary, with a slight change, to which England claimed uniformly to the very last moment of her jurisdiction over what now constitute these United States.

The change is this: After the conquest of Canada, being then possessed of Nova Scotia also, she carried the boundaries of Canada south to the heights which turn the northern rivers into the St. Lawrence; but, independent of that, she kept the boundary of Nova Scotia virtually the same as before; and the same as Mitchell, her own geographer under the Lords of Plantations, had laid it down in 1755 on his map; and the same as has ever been claimed by this country since the peace of 1783.

Now, let it be recollected that this British official map of Mitchell was before the commissioners who formed the treaty of 1783. Both sides concede this, in the arguments prepared for the King of Holland, now in my hand. Recollect, too, that the line on that map runs due north from the source of the St. Croix till it strikes the St. Lawrence; and not west from the St. Croix, as on this French map. Recollect that the line described in the treaty is to run north of the St. Croix, precisely as it appears on that map, till it strikes the highlands froin which spring the tributaries of the St. Lawrence, and which are near to its bank. Recollect that Doctor Franklin was by birth a Massachusetts man, and had been the agent of that province, and familiar with all its claims to boundary up to that line.

Recollect that he had got inserted into the preliminaries of peace an agreement to go still further east, and make the St. John, from its mouth to its source, the boundary, as more convenient, and, in many respects, more eligible to us than the old boundary.

Recollect that, when coming to sign the treaty, this was so strenuously opposed by England, on the ground of its being a new cession of territory, that the old line was agreed to be adhered to, and was intended to be described in the treaty.

Recollect all these circumstances; and then say, how could he, in a letter to Count Vergennes on the 6th of December, 1782, mean to refer to any map but Mitchell's, or any line on that or any other map, except the old line, as there laid down, till it reached the highlands north of, and near the St. Lawrence? He lacked neither information, vigilance, nor shrewdness. But a supposition (which some gentlemen make) that he referred to some map having our boundary-line run nearly west from the St. Croix, and cutting us off, also, from the sources of even the Penobscot, Kennebec, and Connecticut-a line not running north at all, as the treaty requires--a line not touching in that direction any highlands which turn waters into the St. Lawrence, as the treaty requires--a line contrary to Mitchell and all the former British as well as Massachusetts claims-and a line at war with even his own express instructions,-is an imputation of carelessness and ignorance altogether unfounded in any facts before us. It does not appear that he ever saw the old French map spoken of, and of which a partial copy is sent to us--much less referred to it; and the red lines on it are undoubtedly the old French lines, put on it when made in 1715, instead of 1782; and are those claimed by France when she owned Nova Scotia and Canada, and were never thought of as describing the boundary between us and England, as arranged in the treaty of peace.

For further confirmation of this view, and of the validity of our whole claim, Doctor Franklin, only eight days after, (viz December 14, 1782) wrote to Mr. Livingston that the old line of boundary was agreed on, and was to be run out afterwards between the parties. (See, also, his letter on the 14th of October, 1782, but twenty-three days

The British Treaty-Mr. Woodbury.

previous.) Here are both the letters, in the argument prepared for the King of Holland in 1827. So, nearly thirty other maps, published by England and her citizens, between 1763 and 1783, draw the boundary line as we claim it. Indeed, Mr. Gallatin collected more than fifty of that kind, in all; and one in Mr. Jefferson's collection, engraved in 1783, to show the limits under the treaty, by Osgood Carlton--a man of science and practical skill, as well as belonging to Massachusetts, and well acquainted with her localities. Belore any controversy, or any motive existed to mislead, he laid down the boundary there as now claimed; and, to avoid mistakes as to dotted lines or coloring, he had printed on the map itself that this eastern line, as we have always claimed it, was "the boundary line between Britain and America," under the treaty of peace. Another map before me, in Mr. Gallatin's last memoir, made by Gov. Pownal, in 1776, lays down the same line as the eastern limit of Massachusetts; and others still, of the same date, by Carver, and others; and another by Bowen, in 1763. These are all English in their origin-several of them official in their character;--and the whole, so far as regards the evidence to be derived from maps, entirely conclusive as to the right of the United States to the whole territory in dispute.

Mr. W. said he could fortify this position by a mass of documents and evidence of a different character; for he had devoted considerable attention to this topic ever since 1819, when the northwestern boundary of New Hampshire had become hazarded in the controversy concerning some of the limits in the treaty of 1783. But he should occupy too much time, if he now entered into this point

ther.

[Several Senators said, No: go on.]

Senate.

Let our decision, then, be what it may on the whole treaty, he must insist that, if in favor of the ratification, (as it probably would be,) it should not be so on account of any just doubt created by the old maps concerning the full claim of Maine, as originally set up; nor on account of any equivalent in any new territory obtained for New Hampshire, beyond what her original limits justified, and what she had long claimed and enjoyed.

[On the ensuing day, the chairman referred to some correspondence, in 1833, between the British Government and the State Department, showing a willingness on our side to deviate west from a duenorth line from the St. Croix, provided such highlands as are described in the treaty of 1783 were not discovered at the end of that line. And he, as well as Mr. EVANS, argued thence, that the origi nal claim had been in some respect abandoned by the past administration. The chairman also referred to some new letters by Lord Palmerston, showing that in the case of the Caroline the Amer ican Executive--or, at least, the Secretary of State--knew, before 1840, that Great Britain intended to make no apology for that outrage.]

Mr. WOODBURY expressed his regret that the con duct of two of his former associates in office had been called in question, who were not now here--and, he lamented to add, were not in existence-so as to vindicate themselves. He must ask the indulgence of the Senate a few minutes, to correct what he considered an erroneous impression as to the conduct of both of them.

The proposition made by Mr. Livingston, as to a deviation from a due-north line, was only hypothet fur-ical--was very limited in its effects, in any event

Mr. W. observed that, at this late period of the session, he felt reluctant to do it; though, before sitting down, he would advert a moment to one other reason which had been urged for assenting to the treaty, with diminished limits on the northeast. It was, that certain equivalents had been gained elsewhere, and, among the rest, on the northwestern boundary of New Hampshire. This last impression was erroneous. He must say, once for all, that we had not gained a foot of land there to which that State was not clearly entitled.

Without entering into details, which might be tedious to others than citizens of New Hampshire, it was enough to say, on this occasion, that the northwesternmost head of Connecticut river-which was the boundary described in the treaty of 1783--was still further west than Hall's stream, described in this treaty of 1842. That head was Lynch's stream; and, as is apparent on Bouchette's map of Canada, (hanging before us,) would, if adopted, give to the United States several thousand acres more land than we now obtained. But, as New Hampshire had not surveyed and exercised jurisdiction west of Hall's stream, she could not insist on going further on her account; and the land between that stream and Lynch's, if awarded to the United States, must, therefore, belong to the General Government'

It was for them, then, and not for her to complain, as to what was lost between those two streams. But that New Hampshire had a right to go as far as Hall's stream, was apparent on all the modern maps made since the country was explored fully, as being more northwest than Indian stream, or Perry's brook, or the main branch of the Connecticut. This last was strangely selected by the King of Holland as the north westernmost head, when it is the northeast one. It was also apparent on both Bowen's and Pownal's maps, made as long ago as 1776, as well as several others.

But, beyond this, the State of New Hampshire had, as early as 1789, surveyed to the source of this very stream, and run down to its mouth, as her northwest boundary; and ever since, when occasion required, had exercised jurisdiction to it.

All this, with other proofs, are fully detailed in a document referred to in the correspondence before us, which was prepared by myself, and published in the second volume of the New Hampshire Historical Collections, as long ago as 1827.

He took this occasion to do the justice to both the Secretary of State and Lord Ashburton, to add, that, after the New Hampshire delegation invited attention to that document, and one of them explained the strong evidence which existed in it against the narrower line first proposed in this negotiation, as set out in page 67 of the correspondence, they both seemed satisfied that New Hampshire should rightfully hold to Hall's stream.

and originated in this way: As long ago as 1827 or 1828, when considering the convention to refer this controversy to the arbitrament of the King of Hol land, some gentleman in the Senate had suggested that, after a due-north line from the source of the St. Croix crossed the St. John, and approached the highlands whence streams flow into the St. Law rence one way, and the Atlantic ocean the other, it would first strike some streams running into the Bay of Chaleurs, or the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They thence argued that it might be necessary, in that event, to deviate a little to the west, and go round the sources of those streams till those highlands were reached from which waters flowed into the St. Lawrence to the north, and into the Atlantic ocean to the east and southeast. The treaty of 1783 also called for natural monuments at that point, by calling for highlands of that character, as well as mentioned a descriptive corner in the northwest angle of Nova Scotia. Mr. Liv. ingston supposed that, in fact, both would be found to agree or coincide at a due north point, as he says in his letter; but if they should not, he adds-as a lawyer would, and must, on sound legal princi ples-that the natural monuments must govern, rather than the descriptive corner.

All he proposed, then, was what the law of the case required-which is, that if the monument and the angle were not found to coincide, a deviation might be made to the west far enough to strike the natural monument. But every one can see by this map of the commissioners that the deviation, if made at all, instead of coming down near the Brit ish line at Mars Hill, or even to the St. John, would be only a few miles west from a line due north from the St. Croix--being a gore, wider at one end, and a point at the other-leaving nine tenths of the whole claim, if not all, with Maine, as before.

What is very conclusive evidence that the British, as well as Mr. Livingston, knew that this de viation must be small, if any, the proposition was refused by their ambassador.

So far from there being any pretence, then, that the deviation could in fact come south of the St. John, it is stated in Sir Charles Vaughan's letter expressly that it could not, in any event, probably go south of the St. John, nor even much beyond the St. Francis; and he adds that

"The assent of the British Government to the proposition of Mr. Livingston would concede to the Government of the United States nearly all they had hitherto claimed."-- Message to Sen ate, 24th Cong., 1st sess. Dec. 414, p. 17.

Let us, then, hear no more of this as an aban donment of the American claim, either in the view of the American cabinet, or of their lynx-eyed Brit lish opponents.

In respect to Lord Palmerston's recent letter, imputing to the past administration, or to Mr. For syth, before 1840, any official knowledge that the

27TH CONG.... 3D SESE.

are encouraged to repeat their most serious facts upon us, by the perfect immunity which both themselves and their Government have experienced. And to expedite their release, if hereafter arrested for such facts, they are informed that Congress had been "called" upon to pass the appropriate lawand passed it was! The habeas corpus act against the States, which had slept for many months in the Senate, and seemed to have sunk under the public execration, this bill was "called" up, and passed cotemporaneously with the date of this letter. And thus the special minister was enabled to carry home with him an act of Congress to lay at the footstool of his Queen, and to show that the measure of atonement to McLeod was complete: that the executive, the military, the legislative, and the judicial departments had all been put in requisition, and faithfully exerted themselves to protect her Majesty's subject, from being harmed for a past invasion, conflagration, and murder; and to secure them from being called to account by the State courts for such trifles in future.

Their

And so ends the case of the Caroline and McLeod. The humiliation of this conclusion, and the contempt and future danger which it brings upon the country, demand a pause, and a moment's reflection upon the catastrophe of this episode in the negotiation. The whole negotiation has been one of shame and injury; but this catastrophe of the McLeod and Caroline affair puts the finishing hand to our disgrace. I do not speak of the individuals who have done this work, but of the national honor which has been tarnished in their hands. Up to the end of Mr. Van Buren's administration, all was safe for the honor of the country. Redress for the outrage at Schlosser had been demanded; interference to release McLeod had been refused; the false application of the laws of war to a state of peace had been scouted. On the 4th day of March, 1841, the national honor was safe; but on that day its degradation commenced. 'Timing their movements with a calculated precision, the British Government transmitted their assumption of the Schlosser outrage, their formal demand for the release of McLeod, and their threat in the event of refusal, so as to arrive here on the evening of the day on which the new administration received the reins of Government. assumption, demand, and threat, arrived in Washington on the evening of the 4th day of March, a few hours after the inauguration of the new powers was over. It seemed as if the British had said to themselves: This is the time-our friends are in power-we helped to elect them-now is the time to begin. And begin they did. On the 8th day of March, Mr. Fox delivered to Mr. Webster the formal notification of the assumption, made the demand, and delivered the threat. Then the disgraceful scene began. They reverse the decision of Mr. Van Buren's administration, and determine to interfere in behalf of McLeod, and to extricate him by all means from the New York courts. mask the ignominy of this interference, they pretend it is to get at a nobler antagonist; and that they are going to act the Romans, in sparing the humble and subduing the proud. It is with Queen Victoria with whom they will deal! McLeod is too humble game for them. McLeod released, the next thing is to get out of the scrape with the Queen; and for that purpose they invent a false reading of the law of nations, and apply the laws of war to a state of peace. The jus belli, and not the jus gentium, then becomes their resort. And here ends their grand imitation of the Roman character. To assume the laws of war in time of peace, in order to cover a craven retreat, is the nearest approach which they make to war. Then the special minister comes. They accept from him private and verbal explanations, in full satisfaction to themselves of all the outrage at Schlosser: but beg the minister to write them a little apology, which they can show to the people. The minister refuses; and thereupon they assume that they have received it, and proclaim the apology to the world. To finnish this scene, to complete the propitiation of the Queen, and to send her minister home with legal and parchment evidence in his hand of our humiliation, the expression of regret for the arrest and detention of McLeod is officiously and gratuitously renewed; the prospect of a like detention of any of her Majesty's subjects in future is pathetically deplored; and, to expedite their delivery from State

Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.-Mr. Rives's speech.

The British Treaty Mr. Woodbury.

courts when they again invade our soil, murder our citizens, and burn our vessels, the minister is informed that Congress has been "called" upon to pass a law to protect them from these courts. And here "a most serious fact" presents itself. Congress has actually obeyed the "call"-passed the actsecured her Majesty's subjects in future-and given the legal parchment evidence of his success to her minister before he departs for his home. The 'infamous act-the habeas corpus against the States -squeamishly called the "remedial justice act"--is now on the statute-book; the original polluting our code of law, the copy lying at the footstool of the British Queen. And this is the point we have reached. In the short space of a year and a half, the national character has been run down, from the pinnacle of honor to the abyss of disgrace. I limit myself now to the affair of McLeod and the Caroline alone; and say that, in this business, exclusive of other disgraces, the national character has been brought to the lowest point of contempt. It required the Walpole administration five-and-twenty long years of cowardly submission to France and Spain to complete the degradation of Great Britain; our present rulers have completed the same work for their own country in the short space of eighteen months. And this is the state of our America! that America which Jackson and Van Buren left so proud! that America which, with three millions of people, fought and worsted the British empire— with seven millions fought it, and worsted it again --and now, with eighteen millions, truckles to the British Queen, and invents all sorts of propitiatory apologies for her, when the most ample atonement is due to itself. Are we the people of the Revolution?-of the war of 1812?-of the year 1834? when Jackson electrified Europe by threatening the King of France with reprisals!

Every individual is permitted to recede from his rights, to abandon a just subject of complaint, or to forget an injury. But the conductor of a nation is not as free, in this respect, as a private person. The latter may hear only the voice of generos ity, and, in an affair which interests none but himself alone, deliver himself up to the pleasure he finds in doing good, to his love of peace and tranquility. The representative of a nation -a sovereign-cannot consult himsell; cannot abandon himself to his own inclination. The rights of the nation are benefits of the nation-are benefits of which the sovereign is only administrator, and he ought to dispose of them no further than as he has reason to believe the nation itself would dispose of them. Seldom is it safe for a nation to dissemble or pardon

an injury, unless it he manifestly in a situation to crush those who are so rash as to dare to offend it. It is then glorious to pardon those who acknowledge their faulis. Parcere subjectis et debellare superbos: and it may do this with safety. But, between two powers that are nearly equal, suffering an injury, without requiring complete satisfaction, is almost al ways imputed to WEAKNESS or COWARDICE: it is the means of soon receiving from them those that are most ATROCIOUS. [Vattel's Law of Nations.

Senate.

Massachusetts are domestic and legislative questions; and, as claims addressed to Congress, I shall consider them, and do what I believe to be right. As treaty stipulations, I shall resist these payments; for I cannot admit the policy or the right of Great Britain to interfere between the Union and its members, and to acquire the character of mediator, protector, guarantee or remonstrant between them. The fugitive offenders article I consider inoperative without the aid of an act of Congress; and that aid I shall be unwilling to give, because I consider the stipulations of the article as dangerous to foreigners who may come to our country, and useless to us, in the two eminent cases in which the surrender of fugitive criminals would be most wanting the cases of slaves and counterfeiters. The alliance articles, both naval and diplomatic, I hold to be beyond the pale both of the treaty, making and legislative power, and eminently dangerous and unwise; and shall oppose them in all the forms in which the question of their execution shall come before me. I shall defeat the appropriations for this African squadron, and for the pay and outfit of these remonstrating ambassadors, if I can; and if Great Britain complains, and demands the execution of the treaty in these particu. lars, I shall consider it a demand for the tributethe tribute in men, money and ships-which we are to pay her for five years' exemption from British search, and for so many years' reprieve from intended subjugation to the quintuple alli

ance.

BRITISH TREATY. [SECRET SESSION.]

SPEECH OF MR. WOODBURY,

OF NEW HAMPSHIRE.

There is a similar map in the French atlas, on the table of the Secretary, which I procured from the State Department. The publications of that day

27TH CONG....3D SESS.

Now, let it be recollected that this British official map of Mitchell was before the commissioners who formed the treaty of 1783. Both sides concede this, in the arguments prepared for the King of Holland, now in my hand. Recollect, too, that the line on that map runs due north from the source of the St. Croix till it strikes the St. Lawrence; and not west from the St. Croix, as on this French map. Recollect that the line described in the treaty is to run north of the St. Croix, precisely as it appears on that map, till it strikes the highlands from which spring the tributaries of the St. Lawrence, and which are near to its bank. Recollect that Doctor Franklin was by birth a Massachusetts man, and had been the agent of that province, and familiar with all its claims to boundary up to that line.

Recollect all these circumstances; and then say, how could he, in a letter to Count Vergennes on the 6th of December, 1782, mean to refer to any map but Mitchell's, or any line on that or any other map, except the old line, as there laid down, till it reached the highlands north of, and near the St. Lawrence? He lacked neither information, vigilance, nor shrewdness. But a supposition (which some gentlemen make) that he referred to some map having our boundary line run nearly west from the St. Croix, and cutting us off, also, from the sources of even the Penobscot, Kennebec, and Connecticut-a line not running north at all, as the treaty requires--a line not touching in that direction any highlands which turn waters into the St. Lawrence, as the treaty requires--a line contrary to Mitchell and all the former British as well as Massachusetts claims-and a line at war with even his own express instructions,-is an imputation of carelessness and ignorance altogether unfounded in any facts before us. It does not appear that he ever saw the old French map spoken of, and of which a partial copy is sent to us-much less referred to it; and the red lines on it are undoubtedly the old French lines, put on it when made in 1745, instead of 1782; and are those claimed by France when she owned Nova Scotia and Canada, and were never thought of as describing the boundary between us and England, as arranged in the treaty of peace.

For further confirmation of this view, and of the validity of our whole claim, Doctor Franklin, only eight days after, (viz. December 14, 1782) wrote to Mr. Livingston that the old line of boundary was agreed on, and was to be run out afterwards between the parties. (See, also, his letter on the 14th of October, 1782, but twenty-three days

The British Treaty-Mr. Woodbury.

previous.) Here are both the letters, in the argument prepared for the King of Holland in 1827. So, nearly thirty other maps, published by Eng. land and her citizens, between 1763 and 1783, draw the boundary line as we claim it. Indeed, Mr. Gallatin collected more than fifty of that kind, in all; and one in Mr. Jefferson's collection, engraved in 1783, to show the limits under the treaty, by Osgood Carlton-a man of science and practical skill, as well as belonging to Massachusetts, and well acquainted with her localities. Before any contro-. versy, or any motive existed to mislead, he laid down the boundary there as now claimed; and, to avoid mistakes as to dotted lines or coloring, he had printed on the map itself that this eastern line, as we have always claimed it, was "the boundary line between Britain and America," under the treaty of peace. Another map before me, in Mr. Gallatin's last memoir, made by Gov. Pownal, in 1776, lays down the same line as the eastern limit of Massachusetts; and others still, of the same date, by Carver, and others; and another by Bowen, in 1763. These are all English in their origin-several of them official in their character;--and the whole, so far as regards the evidence to be derived from maps, entirely conclusive as to the right of the United States to the whole territory in dispute.

[Several Senators said, No: go on.]

It was for them, then, and not for her to complain, as to what was lost between those two streams. But that New Hampshire had a right to go as far as Hall's stream, was apparent on all the modern maps made since the country was explored fully, as being more northwest than Indian stream, or Perry's brook, or the main branch of the Connecticut. This last was strangely selected by the King of Holland as the northwesternmost head, when it is the northeast one. It was also apparent on both Bowen's and Pownal's maps, made as long ago as 1776, as well as several others.

Senate.

Let our decision, then, be what it may on the whole treaty, he must insist that, if in favor of the ratification, (as it probably would be,) it should not be so on account of any just doubt created by the old maps concerning the full claim of Maine, as originally set up; nor on account of any equiva lent in any new territory obtained for New Hamp shire, beyond what her original limits justified, and what she had long claimed and enjoyed.

[On the ensuing day, the chairman referred to some correspondence, in 1833, between the British Government and the State Department, showing a willingness on our side to deviate west from a due. north line from the St. Croix, provided such highlands as are described in the treaty of 1783 were not discovered at the end of that line. And he, as well as Mr. EVANS, argued thence, that the origi nal claim had been in some respect abandoned by the past administration. The chairman also referred to some new letters by Lord Palmerston, showing that in the case of the Caroline the American Executive--or, at least, the Secretary of State--knew, before 1840, that Great Britain intended to make no apology for that outrage.]

Mr. WOODBURY expressed his regret that the conduct of two of his former associates in office had been called in question, who were not now here--and, he lamented to add, were not in existence-so as to vindicate themselves. He must ask the indulgence of the Senate a few minutes, to correct what he considered an erroneous impression as to the conduct of both of them.

The proposition made by Mr. Livingston, as to a deviation from a due-north line, was only hypothet ical--was very limited in its effects, in any eventand originated in this way: As long ago as 1827 or 1828, when considering the convention to refer this controversy to the arbitrament of the King of Holland, some gentleman in the Senate had suggested that, after a due-north line from the source of the St. Croix crossed the St. John, and approached the highlands whence streams flow into the St. Lawrence one way, and the Atlantic ocean the other, it would first strike some streams running into the Bay of Chaleurs, or the Gulf of St. Lawrence. They thence argued that it might be necessary, in that event, to deviate a little to the west, and go round the sources of those streams till those highlands were reached from which waters flowed into the St. Lawrence to the north, and into the Atlantic ocean to the east and southeast. The treaty of 1783 also called for natural monuments at that point, by calling for highlands of that character, as well as mentioned a descriptive corner in the northwest angle of Nova Scotia. Mr. Liv. ingston supposed that, in fact, both would be found to agree or coincide at a due north point, as he says in his letter; but if they should not, he adds-as a lawyer would, and uiust, on sound legal princi ples-that the natural monuments must govern, rather than the descriptive corner.

What is very conclusive evidence that the British, as well as Mr. Livingston, knew that this deviation must be small, if any, the proposition was refused by their ambassador.

"The assent of the British Government to the proposition of Mr. Livingston would concede to the Government of the United States nearly all they had hitherto claimed."- Message to Sen ate, 24th Cong., 1st sess. Doc. 414, p. 17.

Let us, then, hear no more of this as an abandonment of the American claim, either in the view of the American cabinet, or of their lynx-eyed Britlish opponents.

In respect to Lord Palmerston's recent letter, imputing to the past administration, or to Mr. Forsyth, before 1840, any official knowledge that the

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